BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — Players make the plays. Doesn’t matter how much knowledge, experience or feel for the game a coach has, no one wearing a suit will make a basket or grab a rebound during this season’s NCAA Tournament.

Oklahoma coach Jeff Capel realizes this better than anyone as he’s prepared the sixth-seeded Sooners (22-11) to open play in the East Regional at 6:10 p.m. today at BJCC Arena against No. 11 seed Saint Joseph’s (21-12).

It won’t be him or Hawks coach Phil Martelli who decide the outcome. Capel has tried to bang that point home to his players since the euphoria of returning to March Madness after a one-year absence began Sunday.

The way he’s gone about it is the same way he’s gone about getting through to his players since taking the job 23 months ago.

“(He tells) a lot of stories about his former teams and the teams that he’s been on, and what it takes to win games at this level,” OU center Longar Longar said.

The stories are nothing knew. Capel is never shy about relating his past to current players.

One of the Sooner coach’s most enviable traits is the pressure of playing major college basketball is nothing knew to him. He experienced it as a player at Duke from 1994-97, two more years as an assistant coach and five as a head coach.

Each season, each game has brought a situation or experience that can be related back.

Going through a shooting slump? Capel tells the story of getting benched and booed his senior year while he went through one.

Feeling just happy to be the in the NCAA Tournament? He’s quick to respond with how he felt after playing in the national title game as a freshman. Then never getting past the second round his final three years.

“The lesson is don’t take anything for granted,” Capel said. “As a freshman playing at Duke, I thought it was a birthright to be there. It was just going to happen. We were going to go to the tournament every year and get to the Final Four. We never came close after that.”

The good and the bad of his playing days are still vivid to him.

To those who’ve spent many winter and spring days and nights glued to college basketball games, they are, too. Many still think of Capel, 33, as Duke’s point guard during the mid 1990s.

OU athletic director Joe Castiglione certainly remembered Capel from his playing days when he was looking for a replacement for Kelvin Sampson in April of 2006. But it was his success at Virginia Commonwealth (79-41 in three seasons) that he was drawn to.

“People are remembered for how they’re exposed to people,” OU athletic director Joe Castiglione said. “But around our region, people are more aware of him for what he’s done here.”

Hard to argue that.

The depths of where OU was after Sampson left and the 2006 recruiting class mostly dissolved to where it currently resides is an incredible jump.

South Carolina has taken notice. Talk radio and Internet message boards in both South Carolina and Oklahoma have been filled with rumors of the Gamecocks licking their chops to land the Sooner coach.

The reason for that has little to do with his playing days. You can only become a hot commodity in the coaching ranks by what is done on the bench.

But players admit there’s a trust and understanding through shared relationships. Capel’s credibility as a player carries weight in their world.

“He’s got a lot of experience and everybody knows that,” OU forward Taylor Griffin said. “We’ve seen the highlight tapes to prove that. I think we can probably rely on him more because of his playing experience and tournament experience. He’s been there. He’s played at this level and he’s won at this level. Anything we can take from him, we need to.”

No matter what happens today or throughout the rest of the NCAA Tournament, something will happen and the chance to learn a lesson will arise from it.

And Capel will use them as teaching tools in the future.

“Coaching is teaching,” Castiglione said. “A coach has to be able to paint a picture for players. Sometimes the best tool is an experience they can relate to.”

Capel and the success the Sooners have enjoyed this season are proof.

John Shinn

366-3536

jshinn@normantranscript.com